How Muscles Cause Joint Pain

How Muscles Can Make Your Joints Hurt

Muscles originate on a fixed bone in our body, cross over a joint, and insert onto a moving bone. It is important to understand that all muscles move from the insertion point going toward the origination point. It is because of the placement of the muscles that we can move, but when a muscle is in spasm– or is shortened as a result of repetitive use– we cannot move the joint it affects without pain.

Just as pulling on the end of your hair will cause you pain in your scalp, so too will a muscle pulling on the tendon cause pain near the joint …. More

How Muscles Cause Nerve Pain

Nerves travel from the spinal cord, through openings in the vertebre of the spine, and then out to muscles and organs. When a nerve passes through a muscle it can become impinged as the muscle goes into spasm. This will cause you to have pain, numbness, tingling &/or weakness in any of the muscles that are innervated by this nerve.

For example, a spasm in the scalenes can cause pain to be felt in the upper back, chest, across the shoulders, down the arm and into the forearm ….More

How Muscles Cause Tendonitis

Muscles merge into tendons, and tendons attach to moveable bones. The system is beautifully designed, until there is a shortening of the muscle from a spasm or contraction. Repetitive strain injuries cause the shortened muscle to pull on the tendon, pulling it away from the bone and causing tendonitis. …… More

Muscles and Bone Spurs

What is a Bone Spur?

Continuing with the process shown above, when the muscle is so tight that it is trying to pull the tendon away from the bone, the body jumps into action. With incredible wisdom, the body sends bone cells to the area of the inflammation to “hold on” to the tendon. As the muscle continues to pull, the body continues to send bone cells. Eventually the bone cells pile up, and you have a bone spur. ….More

The Psoas

Pain in the low back is something that at least 70% of my clients complain about. And it is one of the most misunderstood conditions. It is easier to explain if I use the proper names for the muscles. Please don’t let the names scare you. They just describe where they are, and since all muscle names are in Latin, they look imposing. They aren’t. The muscles are erector spinae, and the iliopsoas, which is called simply the psoas (pronounced “so-as”). …..More

The Cause of Lower Back Pain

The problem comes from the fact that the psoas contracts many thousands of times every day, and unless we fold over backward, it never gets stretched. Both of these muscles originate on the lumbar vertebrae (low back), when either one of them goes into a spasm they pull on the vertebrae, and the pain is felt in the low back….. More